The other day, my daughter told me that she doesn’t like two of the kids in her class because one of them asks why too much, and the other cries. She then labeled the two children as “The Why-er” and “The Crier.” I restrained myself from laughing at the irony of this, since she probably […]
I haven’t written in this blog for a while because my household has been doing what I call “Immunity Boot Camp.” All of us have had multiple illnesses since our daughter started preschool in January. Needless to say, writing here was on the bottom of the to-do list. It may still be a low priority […]
Being a toddler, my daughter struggles with the concept of sharing with others. She likes to play with friends, but she also wants to have things go exactly her way. She gets frustrated when they don’t. She is learning a painful but important lesson about what it means to live in the world with other […]
A common relationship dynamic is the loaded question. You want something specific from your partner. Instead of stating the desire, you ask a seemingly innocent question with a correct answer in mind. If the question is answered incorrectly, you punish your partner for getting it wrong. Maybe you want a romantic evening on Valentine’s Day, […]
Lately, my daughter is trying to figure out how to spell things. She knows how to spell her name out loud, but when it comes to putting the physical letters together, her instinct is to make the letters go from right to left. Seeing her do this made me realize that I’ve taken for granted […]
The way a person drives speaks volumes about they way communicate. Today, for example, I was at a four-way stop sign. There was a car stopped at the same time, directly across from me. The driver started to move forward without flashing a turn signal, so I assumed that she, like me, was going to […]
After reading an article about doing a financial 30 day challenge, I decided to try the article’s suggestion to sell one thing on Ebay per day for 30 days. There’s a lot of clutter in our house, and even though we give some things to charity on a regular basis, there are other things that […]
Recently, my daughter had her very first splinter in her foot. This splinter was obviously making her uncomfortable: she was favoring one foot and wincing as she walked around. I told her that we needed to take the splinter out, and that it might hurt a bit. Well, she was not interested in having a […]
My daughter knows how to ask for things nicely, but lately she’s discovered that when she does, sometimes the answer is “No.” As a result, she’s been experimenting with ways to avoid getting the answer she doesn’t want. Instead of asking, she announces things like, “I’m just going to have a taste of this butter,” […]
At some point in all real relationships- whether romantic, parental, or platonic- one person is going to do something that the other person dislikes. It is impossible to be genuine and truthful in relationship without sometimes disappointing or frustrating the people you have relationships with. Communicating in advance, and following through with what has been […]